21 pages • 42 minutes read
Virginia WoolfThe Death of the Moth
Fiction | Essay / Speech | Adult | Published in 1942A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
The Moth
At the essay’s start, the day moth is depicted as a humble, unspectacular creature. And yet, Virginia Woolf argues that the moth should not be described as a moth, but a combination of several different creatures fused into one. The day moth is given a sense of humanity and personality: It is a lonely, odd creature who lacks the intrigue of the night moth, as it fails to “excite that pleasant sense of dark autumn nights and ivy-blossom” (Paragraph 1). It flutters on the windowpane through which Woolf observes the outside world with awe.
Woolf ascribes a sense of alienation and desperation to the creature, pitying its flight along the window as it pales in comparison to the outside world’s variety and change: “What remained for him to do but fly to a third corner and then a fourth” (Paragraph 2). She doesn’t perceive the moth’s repetitive motions as an interruption to the beautiful pastoral scene, but rather a symbol of nature’s grandeur and cyclical quality. The moth’s movement speaks to its zest for life.
Woolf argues that the moth’s fragility and humility make it a perfect example of life, describing it as “a fiber, very thin but pure” of the world’s energy (Paragraph 2). The moth’s life and death inspire the narrator to reflect on her own views of mortality and purpose. By magnifying the moth’s existence into an exploration of the human will to hold on to life, the lowly creature becomes the most pure instance of nature. Woolf describes the deceased moth with a dignified quality that was absent during its desperate life. The moth becomes a symbol of Woolf’s own life, of all life, often taken for granted.
Flight
The flight of the titular moth and rooks outside Woolf’s window represents the exuberance of nature and life’s thrilling moments. Woolf anthropomorphizes the rooks, imagining them being excited to fly despite it being routine for birds. The imagery of the rooks flying around trees and settling on branches, only to soar above the trees again in a repetitive ritual makes Woolf consider why they feel the need to repeat said ritual (Paragraph 1). The moth’s flight fascinates Woolf because it seems so pitiful; this dance is likely the greatest excitement it will ever experience. Flight speaks to energy, the moth’s “zest” for life (Paragraph 2). Flight symbolizes an instinctual freedom unavailable to humans, hampered by material concerns. Woolf’s observations suggest that the moth’s enthusiasm for his flight across the window’s four corners is connected to the pointlessness of human labor. When viewed from an outside perspective, human activities likely appear just as trivial in light of death’s ability to crush life.
The Window
Nature, life, and death are intrinsically linked via Woolf’s framing device: the window in her study. The window is a symbol of the internal life of human consciousness (specifically, that of Woolf) and the externalized world of activity. Nature’s ceaseless stride stimulates Woolf’s imagination, urging her to take in the beauty and harmony outside her window. The moth flutters along this very frame as if it seeks to enter her inner sanctum. Through this psychological framework, the moth’s despair becomes a reflection of Woolf’s own fear of life’s brevity.
However, Woolf’s tone is not at all one of despair. Brief as it is, the moth’s existence also symbolizes life’s joys: It is “so simple a form of the energy that was rolling in at the open window” (Paragraph 3). The window offers insight into the energy that seems to animate all living beings, including the narrator herself. The window’s four corners evoke the Earth’s colloquial “four corners,” further linking the moth’s fate to that of humans. In other words, the window symbolizes the world as a whole, and the moth’s flight becomes the frantic activity of humans who wish to avoid considering their own mortality.
The Narrator’s Pencil
The narrator’s pencil initially represents the act of writing and other human labors. According to the narrator, human affairs fail to offer the same intrigue as the natural world. The pencil symbolizes society, serving as a reminder of work to be done (in contrast to the insignificance of a moth). However, as Woolf becomes more invested in the moth’s flight and pitiful death, she considers holding out her pencil to help the moth “right” itself. She stops upon realizing that the moth will die regardless, the pencil being useless against death. In this moment, the pencil symbolizes salvation, a lifeline between the narrator and the moth that falls short. This failure can be magnified to include the author and her writing as well, her labor being no obstacle to death. From a meta perspective, the narrator’s pencil (that is, her writing) offers the moth something else: She immortalizes his brief life via essay.
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